Tag: 8-4

“Game Boy” is a weekly column in which I write about being a game developer working in Montreal. You’ll find them all under this category, and it starts here.

I was going to start sharing my GDC thoughts this week, but there’s Japanese gaming in the air. This weekend marks the 6th edition of the BitSummit indie gaming festival in Kyoto, and that’s pretty much all I’m seeing on my timeline right now — people taking in cool indie games, and enjoying (drunk) social outings around town.

I won’t lie, it’s making me pretty fucking homesick right now (when you lived in Japan for over 15 years, it’s hard not to consider it one of your “homes” for the rest of your life).

But on top of BitSummit, this week also marks the release of Ebb and Flow, a fantastic new documentary from the team at Archipel. Archipel, composed of Anne Ferrero and Alex Zabava, is the duo that for the past few years has been producing the Toco Toco series, which I’ve highlighted and recommended on this blog countless times because I think it’s terrific — each episode focuses on a Japanese creator, and although quite a few of the episodes focus on the games industry, they touch on all creative fields. They also produced the excellent documentary Branching Paths, that takes a look at the growing indie gaming scene in Japan.

Archipel as a label was launched fairly recently, and is to be the home for all of the duo’s future videos, including more Toco Toco, and even more excitingly, what looks like more long-form videos.

Ebb and Flow — with the subtitle “Conversations on the recent momentum of Japanese games” — is a great exploration of the recent resurgence in popularity of Japanese games on the world stage (they point to the start of 2016 as a milestone date). It features interviews with the creators of all those games (Nier: Automata, Yakuza, Monster Hunter: World, Rez Infinite, Persona 5, and lots more), and I of course loved seeing my friend John Ricciardi (co-founder of the Tokyo-based game localization company 8-4) be included as well, to offer some context.

It’s easy for me to recommend everything that Archipel produces — every time I talk to Anne, I tell her I’m her biggest fan — but at the very least, if you have an interest in Japanese games, you really need to watch Ebb and Flow (and follow that up with Branching Paths, to see a similar story from an indie perspective).

Alas, Tokyo Game Show is just around the corner, and it’s again going to be something I’m going to miss — along with the legendary pre-TGS 8-4 party and big Nakame drinkup at Otaru — but I’m still happy to see that there’s now a new cool event set for TGS week, organized by my buddies at Dangen Entertainment. Not only that, but the Indie Megashow Tokyo party/event will take place at my old PechaKucha stomping grounds of SuperDeluxe, so you know it’s going to have an awesome vibe (bolstered by live performances from Megaran and DJ Uppercut). You’ll find details here.

I don’t receive New Year cards (nengajo) like I used to — although I still enjoy looking at a lot of them, courtesy of Spoon & Tamago and 8-4. In fact, I only received two this year, but they were both from people I love so much. Up top is the card sent by design crew AQ, who decided to be a bit sly with the rooster theme, and peacock it up a bit. Below, the card from my loving Tokyo family of Klein Dytham architecture, as spicy as ever.

As I mentioned when I shared Spoon & Tamago’s post of New Year cards from designers/design units, I was anxiously waiting for Tokyo-based localization crew 8-4 to put up its annual round-up of New Year cards from Japanese game companies, and it’s now up. Pictured, the card that was sent out by 8-4, featuring art by Undertale artist Temmie Chang.

Spoon & Tamago has posted its annual round-up of New Year cards sent out by designers/design offices, and as always, it’s a great collection of imagery that celebrates that year’s animal, which this year is the rooster. Pictured, the card sent out by illustrator Minoru Arita. I can’t wait for the 8-4 PLAY blog to share its annual round-up of New Year cards sent out by Japanese game companies.

For anyone in the west who follows the Japanese gaming scene, you’re probably well aware of the localization (and more) company 8-4, or maybe the 8-4 Play podcast, that they host on a bi-weekly basis (“a podcast about games, Japan, and Japanese games”). I’m lucky enough to call the 8-4 family good friends, and it was huge news this week to get the announcement that Mark MacDonald, the company’s Executive Director, was in the process of leaving the company (while finishing some final projects) to join Tetsuya Mizuguchi‘s Enhance Games, where he’ll be heading production and business development. Although it could be seen as a sad milestone for 8-4, I couldn’t be happier for Mark, and can’t wait to see what he’ll be helping produce with Mizuguchi at Enhance. I’m sure 8-4 will also continue to be just fine in the hands of original founders John Ricciardi and Hiroko Minamoto and the rest of the team — and we’re told that Mark will continue to show up on the 8-4 Play podcast, which is great news indeed.

Most people think of me — and with reason — as someone who is tied to the art and design world, and so often don’t really understand why I tweet so much about gaming-related topics, or why I hang out with so many people who work in the gaming industry. It’s no secret that gaming is in fact one of my absolute obsessions, one that has been a part of my life since the very early days of the medium (from the Atari 2600, Intellivision, and Vic-20 of the 70-80s to the very latest consoles, with a lot of coins spent in arcade cabinets throughout). More recently (in 2008), I covered the industry for close to a year as a contributing editor on Wired‘s Game|Life blog, and I also co-authored a book with Kotaku‘s Brian Ashcraft on the world of Japanese game centers called, appropriately enough, Arcade Mania. There’s also my little “Game” site, which admittedly I don’t update as much as I’d like to, but is still a good place to check out games that I’ve really enjoyed.

Throughout this time, I’ve made a lot of good friends on both sides of the industry (on the development/publishing side, as well as on the press side), and these friendships have continued despite my “moving on” (i.e. again, working more in the arts/design side of things, and my involvement with PechaKucha). One of my favorite regular outings are almost weekly lunches I have with CheapyD (the founder of mega gaming deals site Cheap Ass Gamer) and the crew from game localization company 8-4 (John Ricciardi, Mark MacDonald, Hiroko Minamoto et al.), which often includes some of their visiting friends (a lot of EGM/1UP alums). I should also mention that 8-4 are getting ready to launch a new podcast called 8-4 PLAY (it should be up later tonight) for the 1UP network, and I will probably be popping up as a guest occasionally.

But this brings me to what I really wanted to talk about in this post, and that’s this year’s edition of the Tokyo Game Show. As many of you know, I missed last year’s edition because of my spine injury, and so was quite looking forward to it this year, not just for the games, but also to see all of the people who come to Tokyo for the show. This was also the first time in quite a few years that I didn’t have to work during the show (I did get an offer to cover it, but I just had time to go on one day), which made for a much more relaxed and enjoyable experience, with lots of great parties (CheapyD and Weekend Confirmed‘s Garnett Lee’s birthday bash on Saturday, 8-4’s big pre-TGS party on Tuesday, and then last night with Microsoft’s press party, followed by the always amazing industry drink-up at Ootaru in Nakameguro, pictured above and below).

As for the show, I’ll start by saying that it does feel like there were more interesting game announcements than last year (which was pretty lackluster in terms of news), but walking around the show floor you couldn’t help but feel that there were less booths and less people (even if I was there on a business day, which is closed off to the public). I was getting the same reaction from a lot of people, and so this is definitely not just coming from me.

I didn’t play that many games — I’m usually happy just walking around and seeing what’s on offer — but did at least get to try a few. As I’m a rather big fan of racing games, I was quite happy to try out both MotorStorm 3 (or MotorStorm: Apocalypse, as it’s known in the West) and Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit, and had an absolute blast playing both. One of the games I’ve been looking forward to the most this fall is Fable 3 (I have terrific memories of playing Fable 2), and playing the demo just confirmed what I already expected (i.e. it’s going to be right up my alley).

But the game that really surprised me was El Shaddai — and yes, this game is indeed named after one of the Judaic names used for the “God Almighty.” The visuals are a joy throughout — very stylish and unique, in the same way that games like Ico and Shadow of the Colossus pushed the boundaries of what an action/adventure game can look like — but especially stand out during the 2D side-scrolling sections, with stunning backgrounds that use color and shadow to great effect. This game has suddenly become one of my most anticipated titles for the coming year.

Previously, he was Production Coordinator at Shinra Technologies (at Eidos Montréal). Before that, he was based in Tokyo for over 15 years, where he lived and breathed design, pop culture, and gaming, sustained by an unhealthy addiction to magazines and frequent visits to his favorites cafes (he was also Executive Director at PechaKucha). He has reported on these obsessions for various online/offline publications, including the following: Time, Inside (Australian Design Review), Gizmodo, Gridskipper, Kotaku, 1UP, Tokyo Q, Superfuture, OK Fred, Arthur Frommer's Budget Travel, I.D. (International Design), Metropolis, Azure, MoCo Loco, Kateigaho International Edition, Wired's Game|Life, PingMag, CNNGo, Phaidon, and The Japan Times.